Daily Opinion Summaries U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals

United States v. Brown Docket: 11-1565 Opinion Date: March 4, 2014 Judge: Easterbrook Areas of Law: Constitutional Law, Criminal Law Convicted of conspiring to distribute more than five kilograms of cocaine, Brown was sentenced to life imprisonment based on his criminal history. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, rejecting an argument that the court should have prevented the prosecution from introducing evidence traceable to information gleaned from a GPS monitor that investigators attached to a car in 2006. The Supreme Court held in 2012 that the intrusion on the property interest of a car’s owner is a “search,” valid only if reasonable, but the case did not hold that monitoring a car’s location for an extended time is a search even if the car’s owner consents to installation of the GPS unit, so that no property rights have been invaded. http://j.st/ZZqf View Case On: Justia  Google Scholar

United States v. Brownlee Docket: 13-2745 Opinion Date: March 4, 2014 Judge: Posner Areas of Law: Criminal Law Defendant was convicted of being a felon in possession of a gun, 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(1), and was sentenced to 60 months in prison. He possessed the gun in Indiana. To convict him the prosecution had to prove that the gun had been “shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce” and presented expert testimony by a special agent of the federal ATF that the gun had been manufactured in Connecticut. She had based her research on a search of an ATF database; on other sources, such as the Blue Book of Gun Values; and on a phone conversation and an exchange of emails with the manager of the plant that manufactured the gun. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, rejecting arguments concerning the brevity and lack of detail of the expert’s testimony; that the expert was giving impermissible hearsay evidence in testifying to what the manager had told her; and that the manager should have been called to testify. A reasonable jury could, despite the absence of other evidence, conclude from the expert’s testimony that the defendant’s gun was manufactured outside of Indiana. http://j.st/ZZqN View Case On: Justia  Google Scholar

U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Summaries for November 15, 2013

Kraft Foods Grp. Brands LLC v. Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, Inc.

Docket: 13-2559	Opinion Date: November 14, 2013
Judge: Posner
Areas of Law: Commercial Law, Intellectual Property, Trademark

Kraft sued Cracker Barrel Old Country Store for trademark infringement, Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. 1051, and obtained a preliminary injunction against the sale of food products to grocery stores under the name Cracker Barrel, which is a registered trademark of Kraft. Kraft has been selling cheese in grocery stores under that name for more than 50 years. Kraft did not challenge CBOCS’s right to sell the products under the name Cracker Barrel in CBOCS’s restaurants, in its “country stores” that adjoin the restaurants, or by mail order or online. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, noting the similarity of the logos, the products, and of the channels of distribution.

http://j.st/ymS
View Case On: Justia